What if Changing Channels
by Katy M VT
Summary: What if the Trickster put Sam and Dean into Highlander?  Chapter 3 of 3 up.
1. Chapter 1

What if the Trickster put Sam and Dean in Highlander?

A/N This takes place early season 2 of Highlander. I tried to add enough explanation for anyone not familiar with the show, so hopefully everyone will be able to figure out what's going on. I apologize if it's confusing for anyone. Watchers first appear in the last episode of the first season. They are a historical society who are supposed to "observe and record but never interfere." Some of them decided that immortals are evil because they're not natural and decide that they all have to be killed. Duncan McLeoud is the Highlander, Joe Dawson is his watcher and Richie Ryan is his student. He became immortal when he was shot by a mugger early on in season 2. I think all the rest of the information you need is contained in the story. If you have any questions, let me know and I will answer them and try to add the explanation into the story

"What's with the sword fighting?" Dean asked, watching two men sword fight. They had just been bachelors on The Bachelorette, so pretty much anything had to be better.

"Oh no," Sam said.

"What? What show is this?" Dean asked. "Is it like a Japanese samurai thing? Those guys aren't Japanese."

"No, it's Highlander," Sam said.

"What's that?" Dean asked. "Wait, is it like the movie Highlander?" Dean asked. He had seen the movie. A bunch of immortals fighting over the centuries, chopping off each other's head until there was only one.

"Same idea," Sam said. "The show was way better than the movies, though."

"What's that on your wrist?" Dean asked, spotting some kind of marking.

Sam brought his wrist up to look at it. "Do you have one?" he asked Dean.

"Have one what?" Dean asked, looking at his own wrist. "No, whatever it is."

"It's a watcher tattoo," Sam explained. They're mortals who are supposed to watch and never interfere, but some of them go rogue and do some killing of their own."

"So, you're a watcher?" Dean asked, rubbing his head.

"I guess. What's wrong?"

"I've had a headache ever since we got here," Dean said, just as one of the immortals cut of the head of the other.

"A headache? I hope you're not immortal," Sam muttered to himself.

Suddenly, what looked like lightning started pouring from the dead immortal into the victor. He fell to his knees and screamed in agony. "What's going on?" Dean asked.

"That's a quickening. That immortal is the Highlander, Duncan McLeoud. He is receiving all the other immortal's knowledge and strength."

"Right. I remember that from the movie."

"We should go," Sam said.

"Why? Because if you are immortal, he's going to feel you."

"Will he kill me?" Dean asked.

"Probably not, but do you want to take that chance. Besides, we need to figure out how to get out of the TV and back into real life," Sam said.

"But, we're also supposed to play our roles. That's how we get from one show to the other. Maybe the Trickster has a set number of shows we need to go through. The faster we go through them, the faster we win the game and get out," Dean reasoned.

"Yeah, or he could just want to stick us in her forever," Sam countered.

"Then what good is running away going to do? I'd almost rather get my head hacked off, then live this pseudo-reality forever."

"Do you have a sword on you?" Sam asked. If he magically had a tattoo, Dean could have a sword.

Dean knew if he had a sword on him, he would feel the weight. "No."

The quickening ended and Duncan McLeoud approached them. "I am Duncan McLeoud of the Clan McLeoud," he said to Dean, shooting a glance at Sam. Sam had covered up his wrist so he wouldn't see the tattoo.

"I am Dean Winchester…of the Lawrence Winchesters," Dean said, for lack of a better response.

"Who's he," Mac asked, indicating Sam.

"This is my brother, Sam."

Sam almost winced. He knew an immortal wouldn't have a brother.

"Have you been in an accident recently?" Mac asked, figuring that this Dean guy must be new to the game.

Dean looked at Sam who gave the slightest nod. "Yeah, a car accident," he answered, hesitantly.

"Can I speak with you alone a minute?" He had to tell Dean what he was without alerting the brother. He didn't even know if Dean knew that he had been adopted or not. Immortals didn't have parents. Nobody knew where they came from. They just kind of showed up.

"Whatever you have to say to me, you can say in front of my brother," Dean said, thinking that this guy meant to lead him out into the woods to chop his head off.

Mac realized they had both seen the quickening and they didn't seem very surprised by it. The few times in his 400 year life, when a random mortal had seen a quickening, they had run off scared to death. "Do you know what you are?"

"An immortal?" Dean asked. He still wasn't sure.

"You know what an immortal is, but you're not sure you are one?" Mac was confused. "Do you have a teacher?"

"I'm a little old for school," Dean answered.

"No, an immortal teacher. Someone who told you what you are, what the rules are," Mac explained, sneaking another look at Sam. He didn't seem at all surprised by this conversation. He wondered what was going on.

"No," Dean said, hesitantly. He hated this game. They kept getting thrown into the middle of situations, not knowing who they were or their relationships with the other characters. He was going to kill the Trickster, and bring him back 600 times to kill him over and over again.

"How do you know what you are then?"

"My brother told me," Dean said, deciding to tell the truth for once in his life.

Sam wanted to hit him. But then again, he didn't know that he would have handled this conversation any better.

Mac looked at Sam. "How did you know?"

"I've heard of immortals. When the accident didn't kill him, and he seemed fine, I had my suspicions. We were both adopted, because our parents couldn't have kids. It all seemed to fit," Sam said, hoping that would make sense.

"How did you hear about immortals?"

Sam really didn't want to say he was a watcher. He didn't know what season they were in, how the Highlander was feeling about watchers at the moment. "There was a kid in college—my roommate. He jumped from our tenth story dorm window, but he didn't die. He was fine. He had been trying to kill himself and upset that it didn't work. But about a week later, this other guy came by and explained what he was." Sam hoped he was buying this.


	2. Chapter 2

"Do you know what immortals do?"

"Live forever?" Sam asked, deciding to pretend ignorance about the decapitations.

"Can you leave us alone?" Mac requested. This guy didn't need to know what his brother was going to be facing. He hoped he could find him another teacher. He had his hands full since Richie had become immortal a few weeks ago.

Sam nodded and wandered off. Maybe he could figure out how to get out of TV Land while Dean was learning the rules. Hopefully nobody would come along and chop his head off. Sam shivered at that thought. They needed to get back to the real world.

"There are things you need to know," Mac said, when Sam had left.

"Like what?" Dean asked, only half-listening. He was thinking about the Trickster again.

"Now is the time of the Gathering. In the end there can be only one immortal. Immortals with more experience than you are going to come after to you, to chop your head off and take your quickening. You're safe on holy ground."

"Holy ground? So, like churches and stuff?" Dean asked. Maybe he would just hang out at a church until the Trickster got sick of the whole game and sent them back home.

"Churches, cemeteries, monasteries, sacred places of any religion."

SSS

Sam wandered into a bookstore. Maybe he could do some research on how to get them out of this.

"Sam, did you find him?"

Sam looked up to see Joe, Duncan McLeoud's watcher. He wondered who he was supposed to find.

"Not sure," he answered

"Not sure? We lost Algernon hundreds of years ago. There was a sighting a few months ago. If we could find him again, that would be a real coup. If it is him, he's one of the few ancient immortals still alive. Want to see the picture again?" Joe asked, hoping that Sam had found him. Sam was one of their best researchers. If anyone could find him, Sam could.

"Yeah," Sam said, and found himself looking at a picture of Dean. Dean was supposed to be an ancient immortal? That couldn't be good.

SSS

Mac took Dean back to the dojo. He would need to protect him until he could find a teacher for him. Maybe teach him some basics while he was training Richie.

Dean's headache had been a gentle hum this whole time, but it was increasing again. He moaned slightly. "That's what we feel when another immortal around. It's how we prepare for battle."

"So, you brought me here to fight someone?" Dean must have misunderstood him earlier.

"No, that's Richie. He's a friend," Mac reassured.

"Hey, Mac. Who's this?" Richie asked, when they had gotten inside.

"This is Dean. He's new."

"Nice to meet you," Richie said.

"Yeah, nice to meet you, too," Dean said. He wondered where Sam had gone. He really wanted to figure out how to get out of here. It was ridiculous. Holding conversations with people who don't really exist. It was virtually reality and he wanted reality reality.

"Are you going to be his teacher, too?" Richie asked. He felt a little jealous, but certainly wouldn't say anything about it.

"No, I'm going to see if I can find him one, though. I've got a couple of ideas. It should only take me a couple of days to find a teacher."

SSS

"So, where did you see him?" Joe asked.

"I didn't," Sam said. He couldn't let Joe know that Dean was with Mac, when he had said he was brand new, but Joe thought he was ancient. Joe would probably interfere, tell Mac, and then Mac would kill Dean with no problem, thinking he was an accomplished sword fighter, trying to scam him. "Where would you go if you were an ancient immortal?" Sam asked, trying to act like he was actually interested in finding him.

"He's probably hunting. Maybe, he's after McLeoud," Joe hypothesized. He thought about warning him, but knew it was against the rules. And, McLeoud had just learned that Watchers had existed a couple of months ago. He had made his disdain known. He wouldn't heed his warning anyway.

SSS

The Next Day

"OK, I called a friend of mine and he's going to take you on as a student. He lives in Iraq."

"I don't want to go to Iraq," Dean protested.

"You'll be fine. Different cultures are good for you."

He most definitely was not going to Iraq and he needed to find Sam. They probably shouldn't be split up for so long or that stupid Trickster would beam them into completely different shows and they would never see each other again. A couple of months ago, that would have been fine, but he was finally beginning to forgive Sam.

Mac interrupted his thoughts. "We'll have to get you a passport and stuff, so you can leave in a few days. In the meantime, I'm taking Richie out to teach him some techniques. You should come, too."

"Actually, I need to find my brother," Dean said.

"Right, you'll want to say good-bye. Not a lot of us get that chance," Mac said, remembering how his father had called him evil when he had found out he wasn't dead. Mac had thought it was a miracle, but his father had banished him. Almost 4 centuries later, that still hurt.

SSS

Dean found Sam about to head into a bookstore. "Sam!" he yelled.

"Dean, you shouldn't be here, right now," Sam said, looking to make sure Joe wasn't around.

"He wants to send me to Iraq," Dean said.

"What? Who?"

"The Highlander guy. He found me a teacher in Iraq."

"Oh, I don't think you should go," Sam said.

"No kidding." Dean felt it again. "There's another immortal around."


	3. Chapter 3

"There's another immortal around."

Mac and Richie were coming around the corner and Joe was coming out of the bookstore.

"Crap," Sam said under his breath. He could only hope Joe wouldn't say anything about him being a watcher or Dean being ancient. But, since he would be wondering why they were having a conversation in the first place, he couldn't count on that.

"Sam," Joe said, not seeing Mac and Richie. "Who's your friend?" he asked, knowing full well, it was Algernon, the immortal they were looking for. He wondered if Sam had just managed to bump into him in front of the store, and if so what he was doing here. Maybe Algernon had heard about the rogue hunters who had started killing immortals and decided to be proactive in case it happened again.

"Um."

"Joe, you know Sam?" Mac asked.

"Yeah. I didn't see you there, McLeoud. Yeah, Sam's one of my watchers," he answered, knowing Sam could bust him with the rest of his watchers for letting his immortal know who he was.

"You're a watcher?" Mac asked. "You conveniently left that tidbit out of the explanation last night."

"What's going on?" Richie asked.

"This is Sam. Dean's brother. Last night, he told me he knew about immortals, but not that he was a watcher."

"I didn't know you had a brother," Joe said.

"This is him," Mac said, indicating Dean.

"That's impossible," Joe said.

Sam could see where this was going and didn't like it, but wasn't sure how to stop it.

"Why?" Mac asked.

"That's Algernon. An ancient immortal we lost track of until recently," Joe explained.

"So, is that your M.O. Pretend to be new and then take immortals heads?" Mac asked, angrily.

"No," Dean said.

Mac looked around. The street was deserted and there was an alley next to the store. "Come on," he said and pulled his sword.

"I don't have a sword," Dean said.

"Richie, lend him yours," Mac said.

Richie pulled out his sword and handed it to Dean, while giving him a dirty look. He couldn't believe an immortal would do this.

They all moved to the alley. "Sam, what do I do?" Dean hissed. He could use a machete to hack off a vamp's head, but he wasn't really versed in the art of sword fighting.

"He doesn't know how to fight. He's not really immortal," Sam said. He knew that if Dean went up against the Highlander, he was going to come out without a head. The only option was to tell these guys what was going on.

"You're a watcher. You must know I can tell an immortal from a mortal," Mac said. He hated when watchers got involved. Clearly this one was watching immortals and giving the info to this Algernon/Dean guy. Joe would have to take care of his own problems, though. He didn't kill mortals.

"I'm not really a watcher," Sam said. "Look, just hear me out. Five minutes."

"Fine," Mac said, but only because he couldn't figure out where this idiot was going to go with this. He could feel that Dean/Algernon was immortal, and now in the daylight, he could see Sam's watcher tattoo.

"They're not going to believe you," Dean said, wondering if Sam was actually going to tell the truth, or if he had some elaborate lie figured out. Either way, it would be unbelievable.

"Probably not. " Sam sighed, not knowing where to start. He decided maybe he should leave out the part about them not existing and only being a TV show. Nobody would consider the fact that they didn't exist. "We're hunters."

"Hunters of what?" Joe, Mac, and Richie all asked together.

Sam was about to say the supernatural, but realized that Mac and Richie might take offense to that. "Ghosts, demons, werewolves, vampires, that kind of thing."

"Those kinds of things don't exist," Mac protested.

"We wish," Dean said.

"I've been around for 400 years and I've never seen any of them."

"Many generations of the same family have never seen an immortal. Does that mean you don't exeist?" Sam countered.

"That still doesn't explain you saying that he's not an immortal and you're not a watcher. Joe seems to know you and I can feel Dean."

"We were hunting a Trickster," Sam said.

"Like in Native American beliefs? The Raven?" Mac asked.

"Actually, more like Loki in Scandinavian traditions?" Sam clarified. "He got the better of us and changes us into different things, putting us into different situations."

"For how long?" Joe asked.

"You're actually buying this?" Richie asked. This sounded crazy to him. But then again, a year and a half ago, he would have thought someone was crazy if he told him there were a bunch of immortals running around chopping each other's heads off.

"I like a good story," Joe said, unwilling to commit himself either way. Since he had become a Watcher over 20 years ago he had become a lot more open-minded.

"He said it was a game, but he wouldn't give us the rules," Dean said, mentally picturing himself staking the Trickster.

"If it's a game, he's probably trying to teach you something," Mac said thoughtfully. "Did he say anything at all?"

"He said we needed to play our roles," Sam said remembering that that was what they had been trying to do.

"Maybe that means you have some destiny you need to fulfill," Joe suggested.

"Son of a bitch," Dean yelled.

Sam stared at him, until he realized what Dean had. The Trickster wanted them to say yes to Lucifer and Michael. "Why?" he asked Dean, leaving the others out of the conversation.

"Who knows? Because he's a dick."

Suddenly the Trickster appeared before him. "I don't know boys, telling the cast the game, that might be cheating."

"How can we cheat when you didn't give us any rules?" Dean shouted. He was beyond pissed now. Especially since he now knew what the Trickster was ultimately after.

The Trickster shrugged. "So you figured out what I want did you?"

"Is this him?" Richie asked. He didn't look particularly powerful.

"Yep. I'm the Trickster."

"Whose side are you on? Michael or Lucifer's?" Dean asked.

"Michael or Lucifer? As in the archangel and the devil?" Mac asked. This was pretty heavy-duty stuff.

"I'm not on either side. Are you guys going to agree to this or not?"

"Not!" Sam and Dean both said.

"Fine. Next show."

Sam, Dean, and the Trickster all disappeared. "That was weird," Richie said.

"Do you think this is about the Apocalypse?" Joe asked.

"There have been rumors about the Apocalypse since before I was born," Mac said. "I'll worry about it when I know it's happening for sure. Meanwhile, we have our own battle to prepare for. Come on, Richie."

Joe decided that he would leave this whole incident out of his chronicles.

SSS

Sam and Dean looked at each other and what they were wearing in confusion.

"Oh, man. We're on Bosom Buddies."

The End.


End file.
